“We could if they were a twin-blood,” Lucinda says, sliding a look at me.

My stomach knots as it dawns on me that Lucinda intends to use me as the vessel. It makes sense. Twin-bloods don’t need their hearts to live, so I won’t die, even if the organ fails. I’m immune to most toxins, so the embalming solution the heart has been preserved in won’t poison me, and I have the power to regenerate dead tissue. Lucinda’s thought of everything, except one thing: I don’t want to do it. I don’t want someone to rip my heart out and replace it with another one. Not to mention, I’d be Purian Rose’s Blood Mate! That’s twisted on so many levels. I don’t care so much about the guy-guy thing; I’ve had plenty of male Haze clients in my day, and things often got steamy—my “added extras” were why clients came to me instead of buying vials of Haze from the human dealers—but Purian Rose is the butcher of the Darklings, not to mention we’re related. That’s . . . urgh! Just, urgh. Natalie takes my hand, sensing my discomfort.

“It’s a Lupine heart. Surely Ash would reject it,” Day says.

“Not if he had a geneticist who specialized in xenotransplantation,” Yolanda replies.

So that’s why Lucinda needed Yolanda’s expertise. It wasn’t anything to do with her research into yellowpox; it was because of her work with cross-species transplants. I can’t believe we didn’t pick up on this earlier. What better way to bring down Purian Rose, without risking anyone’s life?

“This is all assuming Ash is okay with you cutting out his heart,” Acelot says distractedly from the other side of the room. He’s peering out the dusty window, checking our perimeter. He’s left his Sentry guard jacket in the truck, so he’s just wearing a white vest, black pants and boots. His speckled tail sways rhythmically behind him, stirring the dust on the floor. He glances at me. “Lucky for you, my friend, we don’t need to go ahead with this fukaka plan, huh?”

I give him a grateful smile, feeling secretly relieved. I’m not sure I’d be able to do it if push came to shove. Lucinda shoots a quizzical look at me and at Natalie, who briefly explains about the Sentry rebel stronghold in Gallium.

“And you trust those people?” Lucinda asks.

“Those people are my parents,” Natalie replies tersely. “So, yes, I trust them.”

“They do have an amazing arsenal of weapons,” Elijah says to his mom. “Not to mention a whole fleet of Transporters, which have all been weaponized. It’s very professional. They’re planning an attack on Centrum in four days.”

“And then what?” Lucinda snarls. “We’ll replace one fragging Sentry for another. How will things be any different?”

Natalie looks at me, uncertainty sliding behind her blue eyes. Lucinda has a point. If the Sentry rebels take control of Centrum, then it’s not going to improve our situation much. It’ll still be a Sentry government, filled with people who will put their needs above ours. At least if Humans for Unity and the Four Kingdoms took control, they would try to create a fair and representative government.

Natalie’s watch suddenly beeps. “That’s Destiny.”

“I see the Transporter,” Acelot confirms, stepping away from the window.

Ulrika opens her arms to Kieran. “Well, I guess this is good-bye, cousin.”

“You won’t come with us?” he asks.

She shakes her head. “This is my h—”

Her words suddenly cut off. The lines in her forehead deepen with confusion. She opens her lips to speak, and a bubble of blood pools out of a small bullet hole in her throat. There’s a matching hole in the windowpane that Acelot was standing in front of moments before. Ulrika crashes to the floor.

“GET DOWN!” I yell just as the back windows shatter in a rain of bullets. They thump into the wooden walls, tear up books, smash glasses.

Elijah shoves his mom to the ground just as a book explodes above her head, sending a confetti of words into the air. Everybody hits the floor. Kieran lands beside me. Part of his face is missing.

“Kieran!” Lucinda’s wail pierces my eardrums. “Kieran, KIERAN!”

Natalie is a foot away, lying facedown, her hands clasped over her head. I grip the back of her jacket and drag her toward me, and shield her with my body. Her pulse is racing. A shadow blocks out the dim light from the front window, and there’s a loud hum of engines. Another burst of bullets punctuate the room as Beetle crawls across the floor toward the front door. He inches it open and checks outside.

“Destiny’s landing the Transporter! We can make it if we run,” he says.

There’s another round of gunfire, and Natalie flinches. Day leaps to her feet and helps Martha up. They hurry out the door, followed by Beetle, Elijah, Acelot and then Yolanda. Lucinda is under the table, frozen with fear, her eyes fixed on Kieran’s destroyed face.

I look down at Natalie. “Go.”

“Not without you!” she says.

“I’ll be right behind you.”

Natalie quickly kisses me, then scrambles to her feet and darts out the front door, her blond curls fanning behind her. A bullet slams into the wooden doorframe, missing her by an inch. My heart clenches. There’s no time to panic. I turn toward my aunt.

“Lucinda, we need to go,” I say, stretching out a hand toward her.

Something else in the room shatters and Lucinda cowers.

“Take my hand!” I demand.

She blinks, coming back to her senses, and takes my hand. We clamber out from under the table. I grab the glass jar containing Theora’s heart—we came all this way, and I’m not leaving without it—and we dash outside.

The aircraft is about fifty feet away, the engines roaring, making the trees sway and their leaves stir. Beetle is by the hatch, his gun raised toward the trees. “Hurry up, mate!” he says. The others are already inside.

Above the tree line, I hear the telltale hum of more Transporters approaching.

“Over there!” a voice shouts from the trees to my left.

A Sentry guard emerges from the gloom, his gun poised. I steer my aunt to the right just as he pulls the trigger. The bullet grazes my arm and I grunt with pain. There’s a pop-pop-pop of retaliatory gunfire from the Transporter as Beetle unloads his weapon, giving us a few vital seconds of cover. I force myself to run faster, my lungs burning with the effort. Lucinda barely manages to keep pace, her feet stumbling on a fallen log. I drag her upright as another bullet whizzes by us. We reach the Transporter just as more Sentry guards race around the cabin and start shooting. Beetle grips Lucinda’s hand and helps her on board. I leap onto the aircraft, landing heavily on the metal floor, and nearly drop Theora’s heart.

“Go!” I shout to Destiny as Natalie rushes over to me, helping me to my feet.

Destiny yanks on the control stick and the Transporter lurches up.

The hatch begins to close, but it’s not fast enough. A Sentry guard aims his gun at the aircraft and pulls the trigger. Two bullets hit the metal frame, but one makes it through. The Transporter suddenly dips wildly. Natalie lets out a cry of panic as she stumbles against me, and we slam into the right wall.

In the cockpit, Destiny is grimacing with pain as she attempts to keep control of the aircraft, blood seeping out of the wound in her shoulder. Acelot, Beetle and Day race over to the cockpit. Acelot takes over the controls, stabilizing the aircraft, while Beetle lifts the Sentry woman out of the pilot’s seat and lays her down on the empty bench. Day slides into the copilot’s seat. A stream of curse words spill out of Destiny’s lips as she clutches her bleeding shoulder.

The aircraft levels and Acelot boosts the engines. The Transporter rushes upward, the sound of the tree branches like rats scratching at the metal walls. We break through the tree line, and immediately the aircraft is flooded with brilliant white light. There’s a rat-a-tat-tat of machine-gun fire, and bullets thud into the armored walls and crack the windscreen.

“We have company!” Acelot says.

Out the splintered windscreen I notice three Transporters. They’re heading straight at us.

“Hit the green button!” Destiny says through gritted teeth.

“Which green button?” Day replies, panicked. There are several on the dashboard.

“The one next to the orange switch,” Destiny grunts. “The missiles automatically lock on the closest target, unless you aim them elsewhere.”

“I see it!” Day says, slamming her hand on the green button.

A missile flashes across the sky, and a second later the nearest Transporter explodes into a ball of fire, sending metal and debris raining down on the forest. Day punches the switch again. The second missile hits its target and the aircraft’s wing rips off. The vehicle spirals down to the ground. There’s a terrible explosion, followed by shock waves that buffet our ship, making everyone jerk in their seats. The third Transporter veers off, knowing it’s vastly outgunned, the guards wisely trying to escape before they’re shot out of the sky too. We zoom over the detention camp, flying over Primus-Two, then One. Several new trainloads of prisoners are being led up to the registration office. The Boundary Wall looms up ahead. An idea hits me.

“You got any more missiles?” I say.

She checks the monitor. “There’s three left.”

“See that wall?” I say, pointing toward the concrete structure. “Aim them all at that.”

Day grins. “Yes, sir.”

She aims the controls and punches the green button, once, twice, three times. The missiles all hit their targets. Dust and debris fly up into the air as the wall is blasted apart, leaving a hole about a mile wide across it. The startled guards aren’t quick enough to react as the prisoners swarm to it, spilling through the gap toward freedom. One down.

Acelot and Day fly us away from the Tenth, and soon Mount Alba becomes little more than a pockmark on the landscape. I return to the main cabin. Beetle and Natalie are tending to Destiny’s wounds, while Elijah rests his head on his mom’s lap. I quickly check the wound on my arm—it’s just a graze—then take a seat beside Lucinda on the metal bench, the glass jar in my hands. It weighs so little. It’s hard to believe this small object was the catalyst that started Edmund Rose’s campaign of terror against the Darklings. Now it’s time to end it.

23.

NATALIE

THE SUN HAS STARTED TO SET over the city by the time we reach the Sentry rebel stronghold in Gallium, so the bronze-fronted buildings glow like candlelight. It’s only been a little over a day since we left here, but it feels like a lifetime, so much has happened. Through the windscreen, I watch the city swoosh past us in a blur of copper. Transporters zoom across the sepia skies, carrying cargo to and from the munitions factories. I don’t think we were followed out of the Tenth—I haven’t seen any aircraft. Acelot’s an incredibly skilled pilot, expertly weaving the Transporter between the skyscrapers and industrial buildings. Day is chatting happily to him, enjoying her impromptu flying lesson.

Ash sits silently beside me, his jaw clenched. He hasn’t said a word since we left the Tenth, and I haven’t pushed it. He’s trying so hard to keep it together. His hair stirs gently, sensing the blood around us. We all have cuts and scrapes from the shoot-out, and Destiny’s shirt is stained with dry blood. Her wound has finally stopped bleeding; Beetle did a great job on the bandage. He patched up Ash’s arm too. Beetle’s now asleep on the bench between me and Destiny.

She glances at the glass jar on Ash’s lap. “I can’t believe we did all that for a heart.” She sighs. “Well, it wasn’t a total bust. At least we got Ash.”

I smile, my hand tightening around his. Getting him back was my priority, so I’m not too disappointed the Ora didn’t turn out to be yellowpox, although it’s going to be hard explaining to my father why we risked our lives to retrieve a thirty-year-old Lupine heart.

I check my jacket pocket, remembering the vial of silvery-white liquid I stole from the laboratory in the Tenth. I take the vial out of my syringe case. Thankfully it hasn’t broken. There’s a small label on the glass tube with F-09 WINGS written on it.

“That looks suspiciously like a Haze blend,” Ash says, glancing at the vial.

“Yeah, that’s what I thought too.” I’ve had enough experience with the Golden Haze—a mix of milky-white Haze, which has a distinctively gluey consistency, and glimmering gold Bastet venom—to recognize a blend when I see one. The mix is just milky-silver instead of milky-gold. “It’s the silver stuff the Haze has been combined with that I’m curious about. Maybe it’s Night Whisper?” I muse, recalling the butterflies we saw on the laboratory. Their wings are silvery in color. But why would Purian Rose add them to the Haze?

I lift it up to the overhead light. The liquid glints, drawing Yolanda’s attention.

“What’s this?” she asks, taking it from me.

“A drug called Wings. It was in the Sentry lab back at the Tenth, along with this disc,” I say, retrieving a blue disc out of my pocket with PATIENT TRIALS scrawled on it. “I want Dr. Craven to run some tests on the drug, to see what’s in it.”

“I’d like to help with that,” Yolanda replies, passing the vial back.

I tuck it into my pocket and go up to the cockpit.

“Which way?” Acelot asks me. The cheetahlike markings down the sides of his handsome face are more pronounced in the gold light of sunset.

I point toward a smelting works on the west side of the city, which conceals the tunnel leading into the Sentry rebels’ stronghold. From an onlooker’s perspective, it just looks like we’re flying into the factory’s warehouse, which won’t rouse suspicion—it’s common to see Transporters flying in and out of factories around here as they transfer cargo. Acelot steers the vehicle through the open factory roof, and Day punches a button on the control panel. The warehouse’s false floor opens, revealing the tunnel entrance, and we fly down into the rebel compound. I return to my seat and buckle up as we land inside the aircraft hangar.